New mom promotes organ donation

Frances Ramos and 6-month-old Max meet with some of the more than 75 health care professionals who saved them.

Frances Ramos and 6-month-old Max meet with some of the more than 75 health care professionals who saved them.

Photo: Ray Whitehouse /San Antonio Express-News

Image 2 of 5

Frances Ramos’ son, Max, was born weighing less than 2 pounds, and right afterward she received a liver transplant.

Frances Ramos’ son, Max, was born weighing less than 2 pounds, and right afterward she received a liver transplant.

Photo: Ray Whitehouse /San Antonio Express-News

Image 3 of 5

Frances Ramos, right, and her son Max meet with Rose Gonzalez, left, and Susan Caster, members of the medical staff who performed a liver transplant and Caesarian section on her after she suffered liver failure six months ago. The reunion took place at the Texas Transplant Institute in San Antonio, Texas, on July 16, 2015, one day before the six month-anniversary of Max's birth. less

Frances Ramos, right, and her son Max meet with Rose Gonzalez, left, and Susan Caster, members of the medical staff who performed a liver transplant and Caesarian section on her after she suffered liver failure ... more

Photo: Ray Whitehouse / San Antonio Express-News

Image 4 of 5

Monica Flores, left, smiles while holding her grandson Max as Madeline Welch of the Blue Bird Auxiliary to the Southwest Texas Methodist Hospital presents a tricycle for Frances Ramos and her son Max at the Texas Transplant Institute in San Antonio, Texas, on July 16, 2015. Ramos received a liver transplant after she was diagnosed with sudden liver failure while she was pregnant with Max, who was subsequently delivered prematurely via Caesarian section. less

Monica Flores, left, smiles while holding her grandson Max as Madeline Welch of the Blue Bird Auxiliary to the Southwest Texas Methodist Hospital presents a tricycle for Frances Ramos and her son Max at the ... more

Photo: Ray Whitehouse / San Antonio Express-News

Image 5 of 5

Frances Ramos and her son Max, center, meet with medical staff who performed a liver transplant and Caesarian section on her after she suffered liver failure six months ago. The reunion took place at the Texas Transplant Institute in San Antonio, Texas, on July 16, 2015, one day before the six month-anniversary of Max's birth. less

Frances Ramos and her son Max, center, meet with medical staff who performed a liver transplant and Caesarian section on her after she suffered liver failure six months ago. The reunion took place at the Texas ... more

Photo: Ray Whitehouse / San Antonio Express-News

New mom promotes organ donation

1 / 5

Back to Gallery

The last thing Frances Ramos remembers hearing before slipping into a coma was her doctor saying that she — and her unborn child — had 48 hours to live unless she could get a liver transplant.

The 21-year-old from Harlingen was 26 weeks into her first pregnancy in January when her liver unexpectedly began to fail. The disease progressed rapidly and she was sent to San Antonio’s Methodist Speciality and Transplant Hospital. It was there that she received the bad news from Dr. Preston Foster. By the time he and his specialty team began coordinating efforts to save her life, she was unconscious.

Express Newsletters

Get the latest news, sports and food features sent directly to your inbox.

It actually took 72 hours to find a donor liver for Ramos, who managed to hold on long enough for the rare, delicate surgery required to deliver the baby and replace her liver.

Last week, Ramos returned to Methodist Specialty and Transplant Hospital, holding her healthy son, Max Joseph Ramos, to thank the more than 75 health care professionals who saved their lives. The celebration came on the six-month anniversary of her baby’s birth and the rare operation her doctors call a medical miracle.

“I’m beyond blessed,” Ramos said at the celebration. “Who could have known this would happen? Six months ago nothing was looking good for me. They were thinking I wasn’t going to make it. But because of their teamwork and collaboration, both me and my baby are here.”

Members of the team, wearing scrubs, caps and clogs, looked on as team leaders talked about the unusual situation. Before the event, Foster said that in his 30 years of liver transplants, Ramos’ case was a first.

“There are about eight cases in the history of the world that were published,” said Foster, surgical director of the liver disease and transplant program at the Texas Transplant Institute, part of the speciality hospital. “It’s a one-in-a-million kind of thing with a premature infant.”

Ramos’ ordeal started Jan. 10 when she was diagnosed with jaundice and elevated liver enzymes at Valley Baptist Hospital in Harlingen. Before the diagnosis, she hadn’t had any medical problems or family history of liver disease. As the disease worsened rapidly, she was sent to San Antonio.

As she arrived at the general Methodist Hospital by ambulance, a specialty team was already forming. Within 36 hours of her admission, doctors had added Ramos to the United Network for Organ Sharing at the highest level, with access to organs from Oklahoma and Texas.

Foster coordinated the joint operations between the two Methodist hospitals. The team included staff from various departments: hepatology, nephrology, hematology, critical care service, neonatal and obstetrics.

Susan Caster, director of the neonatal ICU, focused on helping Ramos’ mother, Monica Flores, whom she called a rock. She stood by Flores during the scary, unknown moments when she worried whether her daughter would live or her grandson would be born.

Caster said the teams’ collaborative effort gave her hope.

“You felt like it was a miracle,” she said. “Here you were in this horribly grave situation and you couldn’t help but think of potentially what the outcome could be, but yet you know that you’ve been in very high-risk situations before with great outcomes and you know that is why we do what we do.”

Obstetrician and gynecologist Dr. Lamar Albritton learned about the case after a 2 a.m. phone call. At the ceremony Thursday, Foster said Albritton had worked 24 hours the day before heading to Ramos’ obstetrics team.

“I’m going to see this through,” Albritton recalled saying. “I was committed to this case.”

The medical teams were on standby when the donor organ was found in Dallas. Both operations took place Jan. 17 at Methodist Hospital in a hybrid operating suite equipped with advanced medical imaging devices.

The first milestone came when Albritton delivered Ramos’ premature son by cesarean section as the donor liver was on its way. Nurses rushed Max, who weighed 1 pound, 13½ ounces, to the Methodist Children’s Hospital newborn intensive care unit, where they cared for him for 2½ months.

“Caring is a team sport,” neonatologist Dr. Alex Kenton said. “The goal is for them to live as if they were born on time.”

Once the baby was safe, Foster and his transplant team moved in to remove Ramos’ diseased liver and implant the donor liver, ending eight hours of high-risk surgeries. Ramos awoke without any complications.

The first voice Ramos heard was that of her mother, calling her by her nickname, “Mamas.” It took a day to fully comprehend what Flores had kept telling her: She was the mother of a son and had a new liver.

Fourteen days later, Ramos was released from Methodist Hospital, earlier than expected.

At the close of Thursday’s ceremony, the Bluebird Volunteer Auxiliary wheeled out a tricycle for Max as an early birthday gift, followed by the presentation of a blue-and-white cake for the infant.

Long before her liver started to fail, Ramos had signed up to be a donor. Little did she know it was she who would need a transplant. Today, she’s encouraging others to be donors, too.

“Even if you think it’s not going to happen to you, donating can save somebody’s life,” Ramos said.